Galkayo

Galkayo is the commercial capital of the Mudug region and one of the largest cities in Somalia. It sits at the crossroads of the country: the great north–south road from Mogadishu to Bosaso passes through it, and goods, livestock, and people from four directions meet in its markets.

The city is administratively unusual: its northern sections are run by Puntland while the southern sections belong to Galmudug, an arrangement dating to the 1993 Mudug Peace Agreement. Despite periodic tension, the two halves function as one economic organism, with shared markets, intermarriage, and constant movement across the boundary line.

South Galkayo — the Galmudug side — has grown rapidly, with universities, hospitals, hotels, and an airstrip of its own. The city is a major centre for the livestock trade, for transport companies, and for the telecom and money-transfer firms that knit the Somali economy together.